Republicans Add To N.H. Senate Majority

Former state Rep. Kevin Avard upset Democrat incumbent Sen. Peggy Gilmour on Tuesday, adding at least one seat to the Republican’s majority in the New Hampshire Senate.

Avard took 50.8 percent of the 21,335 ballots cast in the District 12 contest to beat Gilmour by 323 votes. The narrow margin gives Republicans a 14-10 majority in the Senate, with at least one race that was too close to call.

In District 7, Democratic incumbent Andrew Hosmer had a lead of about 100 votes over Republican challenger Kathy Lauer-Rago.

Avard represented Hillsborough in the New Hampshire House after being swept into office with the Republican wave of 2010. He lost his re-election bid in 2012, but appears to have benefited from a strong anti-incumbent sentiment among voters this year.

Gilmour was first elected to the Senate in 2008. She lost to Republican Jim Luther in 2010, then beat Luther in a rematch to return to the Statehouse in 2012. District 12 encompasses Wards 1,2 and 5 in Nashua and the towns of Greenville, Hollis, Brookline, Mason, New Ipswich and Rindge.

The New Hampshire Republican State Committee spent about $170,000 on state Senate races in the final weeks of the campaign, although it spent only modestly – just over $10,000 - on the District 12 race.

The party’s investment in two races that went down to the wire in 2012 appears to have paid off, however.

In District 9, the NHGOP spent $37,000 to help Republican incumbent Andy Sanborn defeat New Boston attorney Lee Nyquist in a rematch of a 2012 contest. With 13 of 14 precincts reporting, Sanford had about 54 percent of the vote. Sanford won by just 213 votes following a recount in 2012.

Republicans also retained two seats that were up for grabs following the retirement of two veteran lawmakers in the Senate.

In District 8, Jerry Little, former president of NH Bankers Association, defeated Linda Tanner, a retired teacher, to claim the seat held by Republican Bob Odell. And Regina Birdsell, a two-term member of the House, captured more than 612 percent of the vote to defeat Democrat Kristi St. Laurent of Windham by an 11,547-7,268 margin.

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Hoping to retain the GOP’s slim majority in the state Senate, if not build on it, the New Hampshire Republican State Committee has spent tens of thousands of dollars on an advertising push over the final weeks of the campaign.

The party has focused its spending on a handful of races that could determine who takes control of the state’s upper chamber, which Republicans now control 13-11.

The NHGOP has poured a total of roughly $72,000 into two rematches from 2012 that Republicans won by the slimmest of margins.